LL2 26 Passed out

Bzzt. The doorbell shattered the pre-dawn silence of the darkened barracks apartment.

Joanne wrapped a robe around her shoulders and stepped out of her bedroom.

Bzzt. Bzzt. "All right! All right!" She complained at the door as she opened it. She found Luke on the other side, standing impatiently in his running clothes and Joanne sighed impatiently back at him, "Next time, just use your Jedi thing to help yourself in okay?" She turned away from him and went back to her bedroom.

"Isn't Kess up yet?" Luke asked.

"At this hour?" she whined and shuffled grumpily back toward her room.

Luke pressed his lips together, hesitating. "Could you wake her for me, please."

Joanne huffed and went to Kess' room instead, "Yes, Master."

Luke turned on a light in the living room as he waited, listening to Joanne's voice in the other room. "Kess, Wake up. Girly girl... Kess!" Joanne's voice grew from impatience to worry to panic. "Commander? She's not waking up!"

Yana stepped out of her room, blinking the way the sleep with complaint. "What's with all the racket?"

Luke skipped into a trot and darted into Kess' room. The woman was out cold still wearing the same shirt she wore at the Mash Pit last night and not much else. Luke could see this because she was only halfway under the covers like she had barely made it into bed before passing out.

Hesitantly, he stepped to her bedside and shook her shoulder. "Kess?"

Yana stepped up to the doorway. "What's the matter with her?"

Luke checked her pulse and checked her pupils. There were signs of life, but he wasn't sure what was normal. He shook her again. "Lendra!" Luke closed his eyes a long moment.

In breathless suspense, Joanne and Yana watched the man do something invisible with the Force and exchanged worried glances at each other.

"Good morning," spouted the sickening sweet voice of the alarm. "It is zero five-forty-seven. Get your butt out of bed and go-" Joanne slapped at the snooze button.

Luke opened his eyes and looked down at the limp body, "We need to get her to medbay. Either of you have a speeder here?"

"I do," Yana nearly came to attention at the bedroom door.

Luke pulled Kess' arm over his shoulders. "Pull it around front." He tried to wrap her legs in the blanket as he picked her up with the other arm. "Joanne, get some clothes for her."

Joanne started moving in a shot.

When Luke picked up the body with both arms, she hung as limp as a wet washcloth. In a worried rush, he carried her out the door.

An hour later, Yana was shaking her head in the chair of the medbay waiting room. "The Mash Pit was packed last night. Anybody could have slipped something in her beer without us noticing."

Still in his running clothes, Luke set his hands on his hips. "She should have noticed."

Joanne leaned up against the wall with crossed arms. "Everybody was trying to talk to her too. Even Wubak from GNN was there wanting an interview with her."

Two-One-Bee stepped to meet the anxious Jedi in the waiting room. Kess stepped out behind the droid, awake and smiling shyly as she zipped her green coveralls.

"What was wrong?" Luke asked, still concerned.

Two-One-Bee answered mechanically. "Traces of kindlunditophyde in her digestive system."

A human doctor stepped out of the same hall, hurried to finish the explanation and dismiss Two-One-Bee. "Kindlunditophyde is a sleep drug," he explained, turning to Kess. "It's given to patients with chronic insomnia. Have you been having trouble sleeping?"

Joanne shook her head and answered for her. "Not even close."

Kess shot a grin at Joanne and shook her head at the doctor. "No. I haven't taken any medications for anything."

"How much did she have?" Luke asked.

The doctor reported with concern, "Enough to put her out for a couple of days."

Yana nodded with the decision, "Yep, somebody slipped it into your beer."

Kess wrinkled her nose at the idea of another kidnapping attempt. "If they were successful in knocking me out with some drug to get to me," she shrugged, "why am I still here?"

Silence fell over the crowd. They had no explanation for that question.

The doctor handed Kess the discharge datapad to sign as Yana and Joanne moved to leave. "Are you okay girly? We gotta report in."

Kess nodded at them. "I'm fine. Thanks." When the Two-One-Bee stepped away, Kess turned to Luke.

He gave her a scolding glare and turned away.

With an exasperated sigh, Kess followed him out. "It's not my fault, dammit. The Mash Pit was crowded last night. There were dozens of people trying to talk to me."

Luke shoulders were stiff as he marched through the hall in front of her. "Don't explain it to me, Kess," He warned as he opened the door for her and paused to look her in the eye. "I'm not the one who's going to pay for it if the Empire gets you."

Kess met his eye a moment, huffed, and stepped out into the bright daylight. They walked silently together to his speeder until Kess blurted out as she opened the door. "And I had such a screwed up dream last night, too."

Luke said nothing as he climbed in.

"It was too real to be a dream." She continued as if he were paying attention. "I dreamt I gave birth to a baby." She wrinkled her nose at the memory.

Luke paused before he powered up the speeder and glanced at her with a slow growing smile. "Biological clock ticking already?"

"No," she scoffed. "It was just a dream. But the funny part was that my husband was holding the baby in his arms next to my bed and he was showing the baby an action figure of you."

"An action figure?" Luke echoed.

"Yeah, you know. It's like a little doll." She held her fingers up to measure an action figure. "But you can't call it a 'doll' because boys play with them. You were in your Jedi Uniform and a little plastic cloak, carrying a little plastic lightsaber." She smiled wistfully out the window to remember the details.

Luke glanced at her out of the corner of his eye. "So who was this husband?"

Her voice was far away, "I have no idea." Then she came back to reality. "It was so real. It was like the other dream I had."

Luke was only half-paying attention to what she was saying as he pulled out of the parking lot. His mind was plagued with the kidnapping attempt and how close they came to getting her.

Her voice was distant. "I had one where I was sleeping on the couch and someone was trying to wake me up."

Luke pulled the speeder up to the sidewalk in front of the complex. "Someone is always trying to wake you up," he complained.

She ignored him and continued as she pulled off the straps, "And I had this one where I was playing Sabacc with toothpicks. And just a few weeks ago, I had one where I was–

Blood red lust spiked out on the Force. Kess stopped talking in the middle of her sentence. She tried to shrug it off. "You know what? It's not that important."

Luke's flattered eyes shined at the steering column and nothing else. He tightened the smile out of his voice. "Lendra," he ordered, "go to work."

Kess avoided his eyes. "Right," she said quickly and hopped out of the speeder.